


Treacherous

by strikingsparks



Series: Concert Fics for Grace: That Time We Decided to See Taylor Swift [1]
Category: Elementary (TV)
Genre: F/M, Friendship/Love, basically I just love these two idiots and need them to get married
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-04-04
Updated: 2013-10-14
Packaged: 2017-12-07 11:11:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,316
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/747859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/strikingsparks/pseuds/strikingsparks
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joan has a first name, and Sherlock starts using it.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written as part of a large series for my friend Grace (sparklylulz). Title comes from the Taylor Swift song, and this is probably going to have more chapters later.

Sometimes Joan feels like she’ll never improve at lock picking.  She’s been trying to learn from her ‘delinquent lessons,’ as she terms them, with Alfredo, but it just seems as if everything takes ten times longer for her to pick up than it should.  She has finally mastered breaking into a car, but opening a simple apartment door?  That still gives her trouble.

It’s the beginning of April, and the air is still hand chillingly cold as she stands outside the apartment, fiddling with the lock and attempting to get out of the drizzling rain.  She wants to curse when her fifth attempt at picking Sherlock’s latest lock system fails.

“Wishing to go in, Watson?”

She recognizes the distinct accent and hint of sarcasm in the voice before she turns around to see Sherlock, ascending the few stairs with his pea coat buttoned up to the edge of his red and black plaid scarf.  His face is adorned with a smirk as he places his key in the door and walks into the building, leaving Joan to pull the door shut behind them.  It’s not much warmer inside because Sherlock insists on turning down the heat to a subarctic temperature whenever they leave the apartment, but at least, Joan thinks, there’s no wind blowing.  She wanders into the small kitchen and sees Sherlock, drinking tea from a mug that may or may not have been sitting on the counter for a week.

“Did you make any more progress on the Finley case?” she asks, watching him sip his caffeine fix as he spreads two or three case files across the table.

“Finley?  Oh, yes, solved that about two hours after you left.  Found the gun with the son’s prints on the handle and trigger; he’d rather stupidly left his car in plain view of the station, and a confession came together quickly after he was brought in. Simple business, really.”

Joan listens to him prattle on as she kicks off her heels and begins rubbing her feet; a few hours on city pavement in her pointy toed shoes sometimes feels like torture.  She's wondering about whether a foot massage would be worth her money and time when she realizes that Sherlock has stopped talking and is staring intently at her. 

“What?” she asks, unnerved by how he leans forward and refuses to blink. 

“Watson, I asked how your evening was 48 seconds ago, and you have yet to respond.”

She smiles a little at his impatience and answers. “It was nice. Emily's still... wary about my current career choices, but she's starting to accept that I'm a fully capable adult and that I'm not just seeking thrills.”

“Are you sure, Watson?” Sherlock asks as he stirs his tea with a spoon. “You're living with a recovering drug addict and breaking into cars and flats.”

The kitchen is silent except for the scratch of the spoon as it circles around the inside of the mug until Sherlock speaks again. 

“Of course, I suppose you've still yet to master breaking into a flat, so for now you must be all right.”

Joan can't help the laugh that erupts from her as she goes on to bed. 

* * *

One thing that bothers Joan about working as Sherlock's apprentice is his complete lack of respect for her personal space.  He seems convinced that the only effective way to show her a piece of evidence is to hold it within a hair's width of her face while asking as many questions as he can spew out before she shoves away whatever he may be holding.  If he puts one more severed finger near her face, she's pretty sure she'll be removing both of his hands from his wrists.

“Watson, what do you notice about this rock?” he asks, waving what appears to be an average piece of gravel under her nose. 

She stares intently at the gray stone but can't find anything out of the ordinary about it. “It's... not in a driveway?” she finally replies, feeling as if she's just grasping for any answer under her mentor's gaze. 

“Precisely, Joan!  Someone must have tracked it here from a different spot, since this parking lot is completely paved-.” Sherlock chatters on, but Joan forgets to pay attention to anything else he says, concentrating on the one odd word. 

_When did he decide to call me Joan?_

* * *

The name slip doesn't occur often after that in the coming weeks; Joan notes each instance and realizes the pattern. Sherlock tends to call her by her first name when she's particularly pleased him, for whatever reason that may be. Sometimes, it's because she has brewed his Earl Grey tea before he comes down from studying a case file. At others, it's when she finally solves a case or convinces the NYPD to let him work in his own way. One morning her name is used simply because she lets Alfredo into the building while Sherlock is busy watching his multiple televisions.  It still seems rare, but she has to wonder why he makes the distinction in the first place. 

Just before May blooms in the flower boxes of New York, Joan sits one night surrounded by a landscape of paper and manila files, attempting to piece together the clues in what is only her third solo detective gig.  She has her hair pulled back because, sitting on the creaky wood floor by an ancient desk lamp, she feels like she has accidentally stepped into the light and heat of a tanning bed.  She just finishes reading over the details of the case for a second time when Sherlock fumbles into the room, phone clamped into his hand so tightly that his veins seem to rise an inch above even the bones of his knuckles. 

“Do you truly think that threatening me will help you in any way?” he says into the receiver, and Joan watches him as he paces across the threshold of the space. A muffled voice on the other end of the phone replies before Sherlock pulls the device away from his face and shouts into the appropriate end, “I will not ask her to leave!”

He slumps into the doorframe and presses the end call button before rubbing his hand up and down his face. Joan watches him slowly become aware of her presence, and she feels surprised when he asks her, quietly, “Watson, how long do you plan on staying here?”

She knows enough to guess that his father must have been the demanding voice on the other end of his conversation, and she wonders when, exactly, Mr. Holmes expects her to be gone. 

“Honestly?  I don't know. I guess just as long as you'd like me to stay.”

Sherlock nods as if this is answer enough, and Joan finds herself irritated with the fact that he has not answered her own question, embedded in the reply she gave: How long does he want her to stay? She's not entirely sure why the answer matters so much to her, but she wants to know. 

Sherlock moves on into the kitchen, rummaging for a late night snack and generally ignoring her. She takes this as a dismissal and returns to her case, trying to concentrate on the details of each line and only succeeding in angering herself as she fails to grasp any of the information. The desire to know how long she can expect to be welcome in Sherlock's apartment is too great for her to pay attention to anything else. Just as she's ready to give up on any further case work and retreat to her dim bedroom, she senses someone behind her. 

“I hope you will stay as long as you wish, Joan. After all, you still have plenty of locks to pick,” Sherlock whispers beside her, placing a mug of tea by her arm before rising from his crouch and heading back up the stairs. 

Joan spends a long time staring at her cup of tea and wondering if the most complicated lock is asleep just a floor above her. 


	2. Chapter 2

If there is one thing Joan Watson believes in, it’s order.  By late September, she finishes alphabetizing the few spices in Sherlock’s pantry, sorting his and her clothing by color and season, and is vacuuming imperceptible bits of dust off the fridge one morning when Sherlock stumbles down the stairs, mumbling something about how Captain Gregson has a case for them.  He comes to a stop before he even finishes his sentence, both in walking and speaking, and she turns around to see him gesturing at her with confusion on his face.

“Watson, what _are_ you doing?” he asks, as if he doesn’t know what a vacuum is.  She continues her work as he walks over, expression still set on absolutely flabbergasted, and stands just behind her shoulder as she runs the thick hose back and forth across the white surface.

She doesn’t bother to respond until the refrigerator’s cleanliness meets her satisfaction, even then only saying, “Well, what does it look like?”  Joan aims for snarky, but her retort seems more idiotic as Sherlock continues to stare her down.  Finally, he turns and stalks across the room without addressing her again, picking up his cell phone and making a call in the process.  She’s just about to tell him that he’s being a little rude since she’s cleaning up his mess when he starts to talk, and she catches the phrases “time off” and “taking a holiday.” 

When he hangs up just a moment later, she immediately asks, “Are you going on vacation?”

“No, Watson,” he replies, heading back up the steps as he speaks, “ _we_ are.”

* * *

Joan still remains in the kitchen when Sherlock returns with a packed suitcase and printed airline tickets, and she argues with him about how perfectly mentally healthy she is as he proceeds to pack her suitcase, all the while explaining his theory.  He believes she has become overstressed from work, is reacting to the rupture Irene’s return recently caused in their lives, still hasn’t grown accustomed to the revelation of his brother, Mycroft: a hundred different details Joan only processes as _I deduce that you are losing your mind, Watson_.

She thus spends the plane ride grouchy, staring out her tiny window and silently arguing with Sherlock, wishing to remind him of just how crazy _he_ is.  She loses track of her inner monologue, however, when he falls asleep halfway through the route, eventually slumping onto her nearby shoulder as if it were a pillow.  Joan resists the urge to trace out the dark circles under his eyes, which seem to come from too many nights of late detective work.  Resigning herself to the fact that, despite whatever he says, she is not the only one in need of a break, Watson watches the clouds sweep by until the airplane wheels bounce across the runway, signaling the end of their flight.

The bustle of others moving awakens Sherlock, and the two of them descend from the air vehicle to locate a taxi.  Though they have landed in Elizabeth City, NC, Sherlock tells her that this is not their destination, and she grows irritated when he insists upon giving their cab driver the true first stop through a note that he slips into his coat pocket.  Watson returns to ignoring him, focusing instead on the pavement that stretches out below the car, surrounded by grass and trees that seem to morph into a green blur as the taxi wizzes by them.

* * *

As the case often is with Sherlock, though, the suspense is worth the wait. Joan stands, breathless, under the shadow of a red brick Goliath, the people wandering its top terrace appearing as small as ants. Sherlock stands beside her, hands shoved in his pants pockets as he squints up at the other tourists.

“Are we actually going to climb into this thing?” she asks, a bit in awe that here she stands, ready to ascend into a lighthouse when normally she’d be helping solve a murder somewhere in New York, a world completely apart.

“Of course,” Sherlock replies before moving briskly inside.

Joan isn’t particularly surprised that he can spout off a number of facts about the Currituck Lighthouse as they climb, ranging from the size of the structure to how its appearance is unique because it remains unpainted, exposing it in a way that is both beautiful and raw, though those words are Joan’s own additions to Sherlock’s explanations.  He stops speaking, however, when they reach the observation deck, halting in the doorway so that she has to nudge him forward to get outside herself.  Joan grins as she takes in the massive view; she feels as if she could practically see the Chrysler building from here.  Her satisfaction fades, however, when she glances over and sees Sherlock, hands once again in his pockets and face the color of rotten lettuce.

“Are you okay?” she asks, mostly because she has no idea why he looks so distressed until he begins glancing around the landing, muttering something about how the lighthouse seems taller from the top.  It clicks then, and Joan has to hide a grin as she asks, “Sherlock, are you afraid of heights?”

He nods vigorously, not even daring to look her in the eyes, and something inside her softens as she realizes that, yes, there are things that intimidate even the great Sherlock Holmes.  Slowly, she steps closer to him and pries one of his hands out of its fabric shelter, lacing her fingers around his.  “It’s all right,” she says, intensely aware of how warm his palm is pressed against her own, “I’ve got you.”

She holds onto that hand until they descend the last step of the lighthouse, but neither of them mentions the incident as they hail a taxi and locate a hotel.


End file.
